Metryx eyes expansion of mobile evaluation tool

By Rebecca Keister PBN Staff Writer

Metryx, a social-venture project hoping to change education via use of a mobile assessment platform, says it is making great strides toward making the application available in a schoolwide format next fall. More

Metryx, a social-venture project hoping to change education via use of a mobile assessment platform, says it is making great strides toward making the application available in a schoolwide format next fall.

“We’re just where we want to be,” Shawn Rubin, Metryx CEO, said recently. “Our ultimate vision is … to have a more formative assessment method and more students getting incredibly personalized instruction. We believe through the metrics we’re making it easier for teachers to do so, so it’s happening more often.”

Social Venture Partners of Rhode Island, a social-venture incubator, in mid-April gave Metryx a $20,000 loan that the company will used to expand its software into a schoolwide enterprise version.

“They are a viable tech business but they also serve a really interesting local social mission in two ways,” said Diane Lynch, a partner at Social Ventures. “They are part of the Highlander Charter School, so when they’re successful, some of that will flow back and the other way is the tool is being developed in a low-income classroom.”

Nearly two-year-old Metryx was first developed when Rubin, now director of technology integration at the Highlander Institute, was a kindergarten teacher.

He and Stephanie Castilla, an industrial designer, wanted to develop a Web-based alternative to the traditional teacher clipboard in order to monitor student progress in real time.

The duo went to work with a seed grant from the Highlander Institute and developed the application, which can track student progress from any mobile device.

Rubin and Castilla were entered in SVPRI’s 2011 Change Accelerator program. The incubator helped the duo create their business plan and launch Metryx as a for-profit social venture.

In 2011, Metryx was a finalist for a Providence Business News Innovation Award via Highlander Charter for developing and piloting the application.

According to its website, Metryx was founded on the belief that the best teaching is done by meeting each student’s personalized needs.

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